Offensive and Defensive Attributes

Earlier I wrote about redefining ability scores for my own use (“Free. Your mind.”) and assigning attributes to them to represent them — when I did the charts for it originally, I didn’t even know what they were for, and I’m still not entirely certain. I thought about it some yesterday, and I think they might be specifically designed as “combat attributes,” an early draft or something. I hope I can figure out what they’re for.

Each defensive attribute has an offensive attribute it’s particularly suited to defend against, and I’m thinking that each offensive attribute has another offensive attribute it overwhelms — I’m still working on that second one, though. Below is a chart I worked out that defines the basic interactions of offensive and defensive attributes:

Evasion, Resistance, and Willpower are terms I’ve been using in place of the “Fortitude, Reflex, and Will” defenses that Dungeons & Dragons uses. Admittedly, I’m still trying to sort a lot of this stuff out, it’s one of the reasons I haven’t made much progress on the game I’ve been designing in over a year. Lots of strange, abstract concepts.